


Many Sorrows I Have Seen

by Sharlock_holmes



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Bard is trying to not, Barduil Secret Santa, Canon, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Thranduil Not Being An Asshole, Thranduil is trying, ish, post-BotFA, this was meant to be funny and then I was sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-21
Updated: 2016-12-21
Packaged: 2018-09-10 19:08:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,550
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8929855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sharlock_holmes/pseuds/Sharlock_holmes
Summary: In the aftermath of the battle, two very broken kings emerge.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Merinia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merinia/gifts).



> Right, so this was supposed to be a crack fic about kisses not being part of elf culture but then while I was doing the planning "Empty Chair at Empty Tables" from Les Mis started playing, and this really angsty thing happened instead. I hope you're still happy with it Merinia! I may end up posting a crack fic too, we'll just have to see.

Before the Battle, Bard found this hilltop to be sanctuary, a place he could feel young again, bereft of the weight of fatherhood, and pretend that the world lay before him, that he could still find warm summers and quiet springs. Now, in the wake of a dragon and a massacre that he can hardly comprehend, it serves largely the same purpose, a respite from the immense burden that has been cast upon his shoulders. Though it has not avoided being sprayed with detritus of combat, it holds no corpses and none of the suffocating responsibility of the rest of— he realizes, scoffing at the strangeness of the idea, that he doesn't even know what to call this land. Standing on this knoll feels decided other for Bard, but he cannot begin to categorize the resignation, the bottled hysteria, the hope, the sorrow, the detachment, the relief that all exists inside of him as a torrent of emotion. 

He can see the battlefield but those attempting to clear the battlefield cannot see him. Bard surveys the landscape as a statue, and with each passing moment he feels his limbs hardening further and further in their determination to become stone. The unlikely king worries that if he moves now, a floodgate will be opened and he will lose himself in the storm threatening to consume him. It is inevitable that his composure will crack and he will dissolve into one type of insanity or another. 

The water is rushing in his ears and it is deafening, until the moment it is overshadowed by the nearly undetectable sound of fabric skating across ground. Rent from his imagined drowning, Bard looks halfway over his shoulder and his periphery is filled with colours of a world shifting from autumn to winter before King Thranduil is fully in sight. Bard guesses that he has seen the elf lord more often than any other living man, yet every meeting, for Bard, is like seeing a sky full of stars for the first time. 

The appearance of the other king quiets the flood to a dull roar. 

"My Lord Thranduil, I did not expect t to see you again."

Thranduil comes shoulder to shoulder with Bard at the precipice of the bluff.  
"In my most recent journey from," he hesitates, "Mirkwood, I have come to find that, opposed to my belief, there are still men whose company is worth sharing, even as darkness encroaches." 

"I fear you have me confused with a greater man."  
The two kings are fixated on the same spot, even as they exchange words, as if they were watching some play and their conversation were just commentary. 

"I know of no other living man who has slain a dragon and lead an army for unselfish reasons."

Bard shakes his head minutely. "I cannot understand you King Thranduil, in one moment, you treat me as though I were a child and in the next you tell me I'm am one of the few men who are worth speaking to. How do you think of me?" 

"I have learned more in the past three days than in the hundred years before them, and more alone than I have ever been. I have become very old and my heart very hard, and you, Dragonslayer, have been through much in your own way, but it has yet to make you harsh or cruel. Where there should be cynicism, I have found you more reasonable and selfless than you have any right to be, and, if you would have me, I should regard you as ally and a friend."  
Bard doesn't know what to make of the Elvenking's words. He had assumed that the friendlier Thranduil, the one who had laughed with him the night before the battle, was the product of his wine-addled imagination, for the next morning that elf was nowhere to be seen. Gone was the Thranduil who had asked him to stay the night, and looked slightly disappointed when Bard declined on account of his children, in his place was the ice king. Now he suspects that the briefly witnessed warmth of Thranduil is in fact his natural state that has been perverted by the loss of (Thranduil has told him) his wife, and these conversations with Bard have uncovered a sliver of the Thranduil that was. In the course of this thought process Bard had turned to look at Thranduil's profile, with its marble edges and moonlight hair. In the silence that has fallen the azure grey eyes have moved to meet Bard's own. 

"Why are you here alone Bard, King of Dale?" 

"You're here."  
Thranduil's expression is one of vague amusement, but his eyes hold Bard in place.  
"I do not wish my children to see me in such a state." 

"And what state is that?"

With a short sigh and a sad smile Bard inclines his head as to look to the ground for the answer.  
"I— today is counted as victory, yet I feel I've lost everything."

Thranduil tilts his head towards Bard and Bard lifts his gaze to meet him  
"There are no victors in war, only the living and the dead, and one may achieve their goal, but to say that a war is won is folly."

"Still, I need my children, and all of my people to know that the deaths of those who fought were not without meaning. At the drop of the hat, I will weep because I do not know how to come back from this, I do not know how to rule or feed this many people. My home is gone and I am defeated , distraught, and dismayed. These people need a leader and my children need a father. I am broken beyond repair." 

With these words, Thranduil sweeps into Bard's space such that they are face to face, and his voice holds no judgement, but his face is one of great concern.  
"Do not think that you are somehow weaker for it, Bard Dragonslayer, for in fewer than three days, you have accomplished more than most men, and elves could hope to in the entirety of their lives. You have a valor I had never witnessed among men; one able to hold compassion, and demand respect, not for yourself but for all. Rare are the kings who can be both kind and brutal for that hold the hearts of their people in their hands."

At that moment Bard feels a great swell of affection for the elf, the stone king, his friend. Before he can rationalize it, he takes Thranduil's face in his hands and kisses the Elvenking. Bard allowed himself to break apart completely, to lose himself in the impossible softness of Thranduil. Thranduil who could push him away with less than a thought, but is instead tentatively moving his lips to capture Bard's in a dance of hard and soft. Thranduil who is so certain in everything he does, is in this action unsure, and when they disconnect Bard is met with a face he did not know existed. It is one of vulnerability, and for a brief second, Thranduil is unguarded, but he does not step away. He holds fast to Bard's weathered coat and for an eternity of moments, he does not speak. Scarce seconds before Bard is ready to make apologies Thranduil lifts the silence with a quiet "What is this?"

"My gratitude. Is it still misplaced?" Despite Thranduil's comment that he came to Dale only for himself, Bard thinks that beneath the aloofness Thranduil is more kind than he can bear, even had he not had a reason to be in Dale, Bard knows Thranduil would have sent aid all the same.

"I find myself mostly unacquainted with the customs of men, and this custom is not one that elves ever engage in, but I do not believe this is generally how your race shows its thanks."

Bard cannot help but smile, "An invitation then."

Thranduil exhales what might be a laugh and then tilts his head such that his lips are in line with Bard's ear, and lowly he whispers "You, also, are welcome in my halls should you ever find the occasion to visit, and know that the offer of a bed still stands." 

That sounds rather enticing to Bard, as from the first moment he saw Thranduil he was arrested by the king whose beauty is so beyond anything Bard has ever seen. Since that moment his affection for this otherworldly creature has grown substantially and Bard cannot help but think that there is still an infinite amount of things that he does not know about Thranduil that he should like to. It is a feeling not unlike the one he felt when he met the woman who would become his wife. Thranduil has not known love in some time and Bard is not at all opposed to helping Thranduil become reacquainted with his heart. "I will have to take you up on that offer." And there is something in Thranduil's face that quiets the water that was rushing in his ears altogether. For the first time since the death of his wife, Bard thinks that maybe he could be happy again. He thinks that maybe he and Thranduil could be happy together.


End file.
